Filed 9/25/20 P. v. Watkins CA2/1

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED IN THE OFFICIAL REPORTS

California Rules of Court, rule 8.1115(a), prohibits courts and parties from citing or relying on opinions 

not certified for publication or ordered published, except as specified by rule 8.1115(b). This opinion 

has not been certified for publication or ordered published for purposes of rule 8.1115.

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION ONE

THE PEOPLE,

Plaintiff and Respondent,

v.

CURTIS DAL WATKINS,

Defendant and Appellant.

 B299454

 (Los Angeles County

 Super. Ct. No. MA073129)

APPEAL from a judgment of the Superior Court of 

Los Angeles County, Kathleen Blanchard, Judge. Affirmed.

____________________________

H. Russell Halpern, under appointment by the Court of 

Appeal, for Defendant and Appellant.

Xavier Becerra, Attorney General, Lance E. Winters, Chief 

Assistant Attorney General, Susan Sullivan Pithey, Assistant 

Attorney General, Scott A. Taryle and Daniel C. Chang, Deputy 

Attorneys General, for Plaintiff and Respondent.

____________________________
2

MEMORANDUM OPINION1

A jury convicted defendant Curtis Dal Watkins of 10 counts 

of second degree robbery (Pen. Code,2 § 211), four counts of 

attempted second degree robbery (§§ 211, 664), two counts of 

kidnapping to commit robbery (§ 209, subd. (b)(1)), and one count 

of carrying a loaded firearm (§ 25850, subd. (c)(2)). The trial 

court imposed an indeterminate sentence of 16 years to life for 

the kidnapping counts, plus a consecutive aggregate determinate 

sentence of 11 years 8 months in prison for the remaining counts.

Over the course of one week in November 2017, men 

wearing masks robbed or attempted to rob five cellular phone 

stores across Southern California. No victim or eyewitness was 

able to identify any of the perpetrators. Police linked Watkins 

to the robberies through circumstantial evidence, including 

rental car records, cellular phone records, and the activation of 

an Apple Watch stolen in one of the robberies. Watkins contends 

that this evidence was insufficient to support his convictions. We

disagree and affirm.

The first two robberies occurred on consecutive nights, 

November 20 and 21, 2017, between 8:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m. at 

Verizon stores in Mission Hills and La Crescenta. In both cases, 

the perpetrator wore a mask, pointed a gun at the store clerk, 

and demanded that the clerk put the contents of the store’s safe 

1 We resolve this case by memorandum opinion 

pursuant to standard 8.1 of the California Standards of Judicial 

Administration, because this appeal raises only “factual issues 

that are determined by the substantial evidence rule.” (Cal. 

Stds. Jud. Admin., std. 8.1(3).)

2 Unless otherwise specified, subsequent statutory 

references are to the Penal Code.
3

into a bag. In both robberies, the perpetrator asked the clerk 

about the whereabouts of the “tracker phone,” an anti-theft 

device disguised as an iPhone box. On both nights, the 

perpetrator appeared to be traveling in a white sedan.

The remaining incidents all occurred within about 

90 minutes on the evening of November 27, 2017. In the first

incident, at around 8:30 p.m., two men robbed a woman at

gunpoint on a street in Culver City, demanding that she give 

them her phone and then stealing her bag. They then fled into a 

white sports utility vehicle (SUV). Shortly thereafter, three men 

wearing masks entered a Verizon store a few blocks away, told 

everyone in the store to get down, and told the store’s manager to 

open the safe. One of the men was carrying a handgun. The men 

took cellular phones and other devices from the store’s inventory, 

as well as money from the store’s safe. One of the men asked the 

manager about the tracker phone. The surveillance video showed 

a white SUV parked in front of the store at the time of the 

robbery.

A short time later, masked men driving a white Chevrolet 

SUV attempted to rob a T-Mobile store in West Los Angeles. The

store was already closed, but the men located an employee who 

was leaving and demanded that he open the store for them. The 

employee told the men he did not have a key. The men told him 

to call his manager to return to the store, but he was unable to 

convince his manager to do so. The men eventually gave up and 

released the employee. At around the same time, an employee 

was working on closing down a Verizon store less than a half mile 

away when she heard a thud at the front door. She looked up 

and saw a masked man at the door with his hand in his pocket in 

a way that made her afraid he might have a gun. When he saw 
4

her, he quickly walked away. Surveillance footage showed a 

white SUV driving away just after this incident.

Records from an Enterprise Rent-A-Car location in 

Lancaster, near Watkins’s home, indicated that Watkins rented 

a white Toyota Camry from November 20 to November 22, 

2017, and that he rented a white Chevrolet Equinox SUV from 

November 27 to November 29. Cellular phone records showed 

that on the evening of each of the robberies, a phone registered 

to Watkins traveled from somewhere near Watkins’s home in 

Lancaster to the area where the robberies took place, and then

returned north toward Watkins’s home after the robberies were 

finished. In the case of the Mission Hills robbery on November 

20, the phone was used to make two calls between 7:07 p.m. 

and 7:11 p.m., approximately an hour before the robbery, while 

connected to a cellular tower less than one tenth of a mile away 

from the site of the robbery. The following night, the phone made 

three calls at around the time of the La Crescenta robbery while 

connected to a tower less than one quarter mile away. On the 

evening of November 27, the phone accessed cellular towers 

less than a mile away from the Culver City robbery at around 

the time that robbery took place. A police detective analyzed 

the records pertaining to the phone for the months leading up to 

the robberies. The records indicated that when the phone was 

in use, it was most often connected to the cellular towers closest 

to Watkins’s home. Nothing about the phone usage patterns

indicated that someone else was using Watkins’s phone on the 

days of the robberies.

On November 28, 2017, the day after the Culver City 

robbery, an Apple Watch that had been stolen from the store was 

registered in Watkins’s name, including his home address and 

email address.
5

On February 1, 2018, police searched Watkins’s home and 

car. They found a loaded .40 caliber Glock handgun in his car. 

Police did not recover the phone and watch that had been 

registered to Watkins.

Watkins contends that the evidence was insufficient 

to show that he was involved in the robberies. In reviewing 

sufficiency of the evidence, we do not reweigh the evidence. 

(People v. Collom (2020) 52 Cal.App.5th 35, 41 (Collom).) 

Instead, we ask “ ‘whether, on the entire record, a rational 

trier of fact could find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable 

doubt. . . . [W]e must view the evidence in the light most 

favorable to the People and must presume in support of the 

judgment the existence of every fact the trier could reasonably 

deduce from the evidence.’ [Citation.]” (People v. Ochoa (1993) 

6 Cal.4th 1199, 1206.) “Because the sufficiency of the evidence 

is ultimately a legal question, we must examine the record 

independently for ‘ “substantial evidence—that is, evidence which 

is reasonable, credible, and of solid value” ’ that would support 

a finding beyond a reasonable doubt. (People v. Boyce (2014) 

59 Cal.4th 672, 691 . . . .)” (People v. Banks (2015) 61 Cal.4th 

788, 804.)

Watkins argues that the evidence showed at most that 

he owned the mobile phone in question, not that it was in his

possession during the robberies. He analogizes his case to those

involving the possession of narcotics. In particular, he cites

People v. Antista (1954) 129 Cal.App.2d 47, 50 (Antista), in which

the court held that the presence of an illegal substance in the 

defendant’s home is insufficient to prove that the defendant 

possessed it. There must be some additional evidence to 

“indicate[ ] knowledge of the defendant of its presence and his 

control of it.” (Ibid.)
6

We are skeptical that this case is sufficiently analogous to 

support Watkins’s position. In Antista, the defendant testified 

that he never smoked due to a medical condition, and that he left 

a key under a mat to allow friends to visit while he was away. 

(Antista, supra, 129 Cal.App.2d at p. 48.) The court held that 

under these circumstances, there was insufficient evidence to 

find beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant, rather than 

a visitor, possessed marijuana found hidden in a cupboard. 

(Id. at pp. 52–53.) In this case, by contrast, there was nothing 

to suggest that Watkins’s cellular phone was in anyone else’s 

possession during the relevant periods. Instead, a detective who

had examined Watkins’s phone records found nothing in them 

to indicate that the phone had been stolen or that someone other 

than Watkins was using it on the days of the robberies.

3

Furthermore, additional evidence corroborated the cellular 

phone data and demonstrated Watkins’s involvement in the 

robberies. The Enterprise records showed that Watkins rented 

vehicles matching the descriptions of those seen at the robberies 

over the same dates when the robberies took place. In addition,

Watkins registered an Apple Watch the day after it was stolen 

3 Watkins also cites cases holding that when a vehicle 

is involved in an accident, its registered owner is obligated 

to identify himself to the driver of the other car or to a police 

officer, but only if the owner is present in the car. (People v. 

Monismith (1969) 1 Cal.App.3d 762, 766; People v. Mace (2011) 

198 Cal.App.4th 875, 886.) We fail to understand the relevance 

of these cases. The question is not whether Watkins would be

responsible for the actions of someone else who was carrying 

his phone. Instead, the question is whether the records showing 

the location of Watkins’s phone can be used to prove Watkins’s 

involvement in the robberies.
7

during one of the robberies. Finally, police discovered a handgun 

in Watkins’s car that matched several witnesses’ descriptions of a

gun used in the robberies.

All the evidence in this case was circumstantial, but

it is hornbook law that circumstantial evidence alone may be 

sufficient to support a defendant’s conviction. (See, e.g., People v. 

Goldstein (1956) 139 Cal.App.2d 146, 151; CALJIC No. 2.00.) 

The evidence in this case was sufficient to allow “ ‘a reasonable 

trier of fact [to] find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable 

doubt.’ [Citation.]” (Collom, supra, 52 Cal.App.5th at p. 41.) 

For this reason, we must affirm Watkins’s conviction.

DISPOSITION

The judgment of the trial court is affirmed. 

NOT TO BE PUBLISHED

ROTHSCHILD, P. J.

We concur:

BENDIX, J.

SINANIAN, J.*

* Judge of the Los Angeles Superior Court, assigned by the 

Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the California 

Constitution.